Carp Catchers Blog

At last! a catch report. Sean and Lea went carp fishing over the Christmas holidays on the Bluebell Lakes complex and were the only two there. Sean unfortunately didn’t have a sniff, but Lea had two jack pike and the very welcome mirror carp shown below. Lea’s mirror weighed 20lb on the nose and was caught on glugged Dynamite Baits Red Fish Pop Ups . Well done to both Sean and Lea on managing to actually getting out in the arctic conditions. Special congratulations to Lea though for getting the one we all want, a carp in the snow!!

Best Fishes,

John

Here’s a nice 35lb 2oz mirror carp I had recently. It led me a right dance as it got into a massive weed bed and even though the lead had dropped on the take I had to go out in the boat to free it. It was well hooked though and it was never going to come off. I used half a kilo of scattered 18mm Mainline Activ-8  boilies as bait and the hookbait was a snowman with a 10mm Mainline Hi Visual  Milky Toffee pop up. The rig was tied D rig style with a size 6 Gardner Longshank Incizor  hook  and a 30lb GLT No Can See Fluorocarbon Hooklink .

Best Fishes,

John

In this Carp Catchers Blog we have one for the future. Customer Rob O’Brien sent in this photo of this gorgeous scaly mirror carp not a monster but who cares. Also notice how Rob has chosen a suitable background for his catch photo which really enhances the whole thing. Rig details are sketchy but a Korda Choddy  hook and a Korda IQ Hooklink  were involved.

Best Fishes,

John

Little David has sent in a catch report.

“ 

I have just returned from quite a hectic session at Welham lake where I’ve got my first season ticket on the lake and decided to test it out as I had high expectations for it this winter having already lost possibly the biggest in the lake!.

I arrived later than I hoped on a Friday night due to homework (typical! My French teacher’s always had it in for me!)and when I arrived with this glum weather I had to set up my rods In a mad dash due to this I didn’t have much of a choice of swims so I decided to share a swim with my friend. After baiting the rods and putting out some bait I decided to speak to a few of the guys next door to me and they had told me that the biggest fish out the whole week had only been 12lb (Quite bizarre for that lake!)

Later on that evening after having some grub I stayed up late having a social with some of the guys, when I finally retired to the bag it wasn’t long before my left hand rod placed underneath an overhanging tree to the far bank that looked very ‘carpy’ ,had rattled off and a few minutes later after a very scrappy fight a new pb lay in my net, it took me a while to get my friend out of bed! But once he decided to shift we got the fish back safely all 16lb 5oz of it so I was pleased to say the least with the result. The rig I used was tied with Korda Hybrid Soft Coated Braid   to a size 10  Korda Longshank X Hook  . Baits were 15mm The Source  boilies plus some home made boilies. I hope to get a few nights down there this ever drawing closer winter in search of a biggun! ”

Little David! ”

Well done David, good luck with your quest.

Best fishes,

John

After deciding to change waters for the coming winter and due to busy banks I’ve had a little bit of a confidence boost. On my first weekend session from late friday evening to early monday morning I had a bit of a result in the shape of 6 mirror and common carp to 21lb15oz. After turning up in the dark at 8.30 friday evening I opted for the north bank as I had been told it was free of any other anglers. After watching the water for nearly 2 hours I decided to fish up the dam end in the the deeper water or what was left of it anyway as this is where I’d seen the carp showing the most . The reservoir serves the purpose of topping up the Grand Union canal so the water levels can get quite low at times.

During my session I banked 6 carp to 21lb 15oz from 3 different spots using  Baitcraft T1  boilies over a spread of bait which included a spod mix of hemp, Solar Pure Bait BYT and crushed T1s over one of my rods. Most of the bites came during the hours of darkness which meant I had to have all my spots marked up to get them back on the spots in the darkness.

The rigs I used consisted of 15lb Korda IQ2 tied to 2 inches of stripped Sufix Stiff Silt with a size 6 Korda Wide Gape Hook, a small piece of shrink tubing over the eye and tied blowback style.

Tight Lines

Dave

(I should have turned my head torch off for the night time shots, but had forgotten while sorting the self takes. Luckily they didn’t turn out too bad.)

Here’s a couple of nice mirror carp I had on a recent session. They weighed 19lb and 23lb 2oz respectively and were tempted from holes in the weed by Mainline Activ-8 boilies. I used a D Rig tied with 30lb GLT No Can See Fluorocarbon  and a size 6 Gardner Longshank Incizor  hook. I was able to land both fish from the bank in what is an extremely weedy swim by dropping the lead on the take using PVA’d Ace Lead Clips .

Best fishes,

John

Martin Deathridge has been at it again catching this nice 34lb 5oz common carp from the Bluebell lakes complex. Martin used 18mm  Mainline Cell Freezer Boilies at 120yrds range to tempt his fine catch. The rig Martin used was tied KD style with Korda Hybrid Soft  to a size 6 ESP Curve Shanx . The hookbait was a snowman with a Mainline Cell bottom bait and a 10mm pineapple Mainline Hi Visual pop up. Well done, keep them coming. If  you want to know how to tie the KD Rig see previous blog.

Best fishes,

John

Im a big fan of spreading boilies over a larger area to encourage carp to keep moving, especially as the temperature is beginning to drop. Its helps your rigs work more effectively as the carp aren’t stopping to feed, they are picking up the boilies on the move. It also leaves less chance of the fish sussing your baited area. Tightly baited spots do produce fish and I will also use them in given situations but I believe that a spread of bait is far less obvious as the carp only come across the odd boilie over your area. It can also help produce takes faster as the carp are more likely to pick up your bait if they come across it.

This is a nice clean mirror carp caught over a spread of 20mm Baitcraft T1 Freezer Boilies on a recent overnighter where I put all three rods in the same area and spread 150 baits over the three of them. The rig I used a blowback combi rig tied with 15lb  Korda IQ Fluorocarbon   and 2” of stripped Sufix Stiff Silt  to a size 6 Korda Wide Gape Hook .

Give it a go.

Tight lines

Dave

Customer Sean Bown and his friends had a fantastic haul of French carp recently from The Sanctuary. Sean reports

 “Hi John,
A top time was had by all at the Sanctuary in France with 54 fish being banked between the four of us, with 5 40’s and some 20+ 30’s, awesome!!!!
I accounted for 14 of the haul with one 40 and nine 30’s three mid 20’s and one at 12.”

Baitcrafts T1 Freezer Boilies  purchased from us in both 16 and 20mm accounted for all of Sean’s fish. His rigs were constructed wth size 5 ESP Big T hooks tied to either Korda Hybrid Soft Coated Braid  or  Korda Supernatural  hooklinks. Nice one Sean, really good looking fish. Photos’ are pukka too.

                                                                                   38lb 8oz Common Carp

                                                                                   41lb 8oz Mirror Carp

Best Fishes,

John

Martin Deathridge had a nice clean mirror carp from Bluebell Lakes Swan lake last week. Weighing 29lb 12oz Martins mirror was tempted from the edge of a weed bed at 70yrds range. Martin was using 18mm  Mainline Cell Freezer Boilies  scattered over a wide area. His hookbait was a snowman with a Cell bottom bait balanced out with a 10mm  Mainline Hi Visual Pineapple Pop Up. The rig Martin used was tied with  Nash Missing Link  in 25lb tied to a size 5  ESP Curve Shanx  hook. Nice one.

Best Fishes

John